This Harmony
by Abel Quartz
Summary: [COMMISSION] - Steven, along with Pearl, Peridot and Connie, journey into the Beta Kindergarten to find the snow monster - the one that ran away after fusing with Jasper. But when Steven finds it, the battle and consequences are far more than he could ever be prepared for...


Howls of the desert wind were briefly overshadowed by the sound of the warp pad. Steven and Connie jumped off onto the sand, and Peridot and Pearl stepped off after them. Pearl drew her spear, glancing each way down the canyon. Peridot had her arms crossed over her chest, and shuddered at the sight of the gaping holes with the bars broken over their entrances.

"I still can't believe we didn't get that one mutant," Peridot said. "But I guess Jasper was our priority. And there are only so many places you can go in this canyon."

Pearl led the way through the winding sandstone. She kept her weapon raised. Connie gripped her sword, and Steven brought out his shield while he kept guard at the rear.

"It's understandable. But we should still proceed with the utmost caution. I have no doubt that it's far more scared after that encounter than it was before. They were all scared," Pearl muttered.

They reached the clearing with the crater and the cages. Peridot grunted and held out her hands. The chunk of metal she had used to spear Jasper floated off the ground, and she summoned it towards her and grabbed it out of the air. It was as good a weapon as any.

"Heh. Peridot, are you a knight, too?" Connie asked.

Steven couldn't help but notice that Connie was noticeably taller than Peridot, a fact that the gem seemed to consider before replying. She stiffened her back, adjusting her grip to match Connie's own. _Green with envy!_ Steven thought. He stifled a snort of laughter.

"I've been utilizing my abilities in solo combat simulations," she said, hefting her makeshift bludgeon. "My main skill sets involve machinery and automation. I would have brought my attack drones, but they're needed at home with Lapis."

"…Cool!"

Connie gave Steven one of those nervous looks. But they smiled, and he knew that she wasn't actually anxious. Peridot's personality was less abrasive than their first meeting, but for their first meeting, he knew Connie and the Gem might have to take a second to get used to each other.

They trekked further until the paths diverged, obscured from dust that floated down from the sands above. Connie sidled up to Steven, resting the sword on her shoulder.

"We should split up here, to cover more ground!" she said. "Steven and I can go down the left path, and we can meet up back at the warp pad if something happens, or when we complete the mission!"

"No, I don't feel – well, you two don't have any communication devices."

Pearl directed her spear down the right path. "Connie, why don't you and I go together? I really don't feel comfortable with you two being alone together without means of reaching us. Steven, you and Peridot will take that left path. We'll meet back in a half-hour. Connie?"

"We'll see you soon?" Connie said.

"S-sure!"

Steven nodded, and waved as they started to split up. Peridot looked between the two humans, raising an eyebrow.

"Wait, were you planning on going together, like in season three, episode six, when Paulette and Percy depart to go to the Pining Heart Point and then they – _woah!_ "

"Iiiit's mission time! Wow! Let's go!"

Steven grabbed Peridot's hand and dragged her off, leaving an embarrassed Pearl and an even more embarrassed Connie behind them as they ran down the canyon path. Shadows and sunbeams covered their footprints as Steven jogged forwards with a confused Peridot in his wake.

The pair slid down one of the orange walls into a basin between cliff walls. A river trickled through the pebbles and smooth stones of the shade. Scrubland bloomed along the side, tiny cacti and grass sprouting purple flowers. Steven let his shield dissipate, taking a deep breath and walking over to the stream to run his hand under the crystal water. It was cold on his fingers, and felt even colder when he lifted it to his lips.

"Steven?"

Peridot crossed her arms over her chest and tapped her fingers on her metal rod.

"It's really not that hard to see the parallels. It's like how everything was from that point up to the season finale, and for a moment I thought that I'd have to even revise my chart! But it's not like you have human competition between you, and that means a whole other opening, don't you think so?"

"Peridot, I really don't feel comfortable talking about this sort of stuff."

"Why not? It's true."

Steven turned, rubbing his forearm and ducking his head.

"It's…a private human thing. Remember when you first asked Garnet to unfuse, because it made you feel uncomfortable? What do you think it would be like if you were telling them to fuse because you liked it? Maybe it's out in the open, but what happens between them is still private. I think that's where I am. I don't really know. Does that make any sense?"

Peridot burned with slight embarrassment, but she nodded.

"Sorry, Steven. I hope I didn't make you two too uncomfortable back there."

"Happens to the best of us!"

The pair laughed it off, the slight schism repaired. There was time and light being lost the more they dawdled, and they started down the continuation of the canyon. It was impossible to hear Pearl and Connie any more, and not even the hawks cried down to them from high above the earth. Steven brought out his shield again, glancing up at the vast and seemingly endless holes that Jasper had used as cages, all over the red walls, hundreds of feet up the slopes.

"What are we going to do if we find it?" Peridot asked.

" _When_ we find it," Steven corrected. "I can hold it off, and then you can throw your metal powers at it just like you did Jasper! Piece of cake. Give it the old Peri- _swat_!"

"That's one name for it."

"Just what I Peri- _thought_."

"Steven…"

"What? Should I…Peri- _not_?"

A grumble interrupted their puns. Both of them jumped, and Steven threw his arm in front of the other Gem, shield raised. They found themselves facing a dark valley in the canyon's floor, overshadowed by a thick arch. The beast rested in the shade, raising its ears in their direction. In the shadow, its white fur looked almost blue, and its natural blue was deeper still. A coat of dust in its fur gave the entire monster the appearance of a farm dog, made more apparent as it shook its mane, snapping calcified jaws to stretch its mouth.

"Peridot, stay behind me," Steven whispered, "and I'll see if I can get close to it. I don't think it's in a mood to get into a fight."

"Are you absolutely sure?" she hissed, gripping his shoulder, inching along behind him.

Steven didn't answer. He merely inhaled deeply, brow furrowed in concentration as the beast rose to greet them. With each motion that the two Gems made, the mutant twitched backwards as if fearful. It was a terrible thing when a beast this big was terrified, Steven thought, scared of two small threats as they were.

"We're not going to hurt you," he said, loud and clear.

Where were its eyes? Did it have any? Steven stared into what he thought must have been the beast's face as it dug its claws into the sand. It turned and snarled, and Steven looked back to see Peridot with her spear raised, attempting to mirror the boy's confidence with minimal success.

But he held out his hand to her. "Wait, wait a second. I think it's going to listen to me."

"AND THEN WHAT."

"I…I'll figure something out!"

Steven swallowed as he turned back to the monster, shield raised. It shrunk back from his arm, snorting in confusion. His stomach turned, but he dissipated his shield, showing his hands to the creature.

"See? Nothing. I'm not going to hurt you," he murmured. "We're going to try and help you. We're going to take you back and bubble you, and then maybe we can help you and Jasper, too, and we can –"

The beast roared at the rogue soldier's name. Its haunches raised and its claws dug into the ground. Steven understood the weight of his mistake right about the time that the Gem mutant swung at him. Each hand was the size of his entire body, the air around him whistling through the monster's claws.

"Peridot! Little help here!" Steven yelled, reforming his shield.

The Gem raised her weapon and forced it in the beast's direction. Its other paw lifted and batted the metal spear away with almost no effort whatsoever. Steven watched it clatter across the canyon floor, raising his eyes and his arm just in time for him to deflect another flow from the enraged, terrified monster. The claws slammed into his shield so hard he stumbled, falling onto his hands and knees.

He closed his eyes as the dust billowed up, a throbbing pain running through his left arm. The boy winced as he put weight on it, his shield fragmenting beside him. His name rang out as Peridot yelled, and he opened one eye just in time to see the beast's claws come down upon him. The swipe lifted him up into the air, and he saw the ground fly away below him for one brief, muted moment before the back of his head slammed against an outcropping of rock. A brief, sickening crunch rang through Steven's mind before his mind went black.

Pain like a thorny bludgeon tapped at his skull. It seemed at once like a flash and like an eternity ago that he had been in the canyon with Peridot, the memory of those previous moments branded into his brain. Steven sat up and found himself in a vast darkness. There was no floor, no semblance of gravity. And yet, he got to his feet and felt grounded in the nothingness.

It was like being on rollerblades and holding on to a railing – not moving, but always in danger of falling. Each tentative step forwards was insufferably silent. Steven knew that this wasn't true unconsciousness; he had been knocked out once or twice in his day.

"What's…going on?" he said aloud.

The darkness did not respond, but a thrumming in front of him – in front? There was no ability to judge cardinal direction out here, although as he held out his hands, he saw them clearly, illuminated by no light and still defined in space.

Steven squinted as a bright light appeared where the thrumming resonated. He held a hand up as a crack began to form in the void, spreading down like torn paper, ripping through this invisible framework. It widened painfully. Pain was the only thing Steven could compare the crack to. The scar that remained shivered at its boundaries.

Now, there was a split in the air that glowed with pale ivory, shining on Steven's body. The boy reached out. It was warm. One more look around this place was enough to convince him that whatever was through this new portal was going to give him many more answers, answers that the blackness could never provide. His hands gripped the edges of the scar, and he pulled it apart until it was wide enough for him to squeeze through. The scar was warm underneath his fingers, as warm as a sun-kissed tidepool, but as unknowable as the sea beyond.

One foot came through, and stepped on air. It was entirely possible that there was some dropoff, some point in this nebula where he could fall forever. That was a risk he had to take, though, if he ever wanted to get out. Steven grunted as he tugged his entire body through, pushing himself into the mystery beyond.

Almost immediately, he fell backwards onto the space where the scar had once been; what was once vertical before him was now horizontal. The wall had become the floor, and it was a floor of polished marble, a smoothness that he could recognize instantly. It was the feeling of countertops, nearly as smooth as the warp pad's surface. Coldness set upon his skin.

Steven stumbled to pull himself upright again, his stomach turning against the gravitational shift but evening out as much as possible. His head still ached, and he felt his legs shaking. This wasn't any kind of fear that he recognized. No, this was worry, a psychic permeation that soaked into his flesh as it always had. It was as if the air itself was frightened, and he was the only witness to breathe out and sooth its panic. The feeling, though familiar, was deeply uncomfortable to the child's soul. How could it ever be otherwise?

He hadn't noticed the light in the center – was there even a center? – of the room – was it even a room? – where he had fallen through. Steven covered his mouth to stifle a gasp.

"It's you!"

The Gem kneeling in the spotlight was almost as large as Jasper, and from a distance the similarities were striking. Both had flowing white hair that went past their waist in tumultuous waves. This warrior, however, had beautiful sea-foam skin, with ringlets covering her arms and face. Her left side had been facing Steven, and she turned her head now, opening her eyes.

There were no pupils. Steven shuddered at the whiteness that permeated the sphere, the unseeing, unforgiving stare as she blinked at him. It was less of a reaction and more of an animal response with instinct governing its motions – and nothing more.

She still stared at Steven for a moment, but the Gem turned back in front of her, knees on the floor, hands on her knees. Steven walked towards her, and she made no motions to stop him or even react. He moved to the front, to make sure that it was the same gemstone with the same placement. Indeed, right in the middle of her chest, there was the ringlet-studded hexagon, with the same pink and navy that covered her body.

"It really is you," Steven murmured, "but you're not really here, are you? Can you tell me where we are?"

She looked upwards, and Steven followed her gaze to the ceiling. But everything was still darkened, despite the echoes of his voice that suggested walls, perhaps even a ceiling. A low humming filled the air, and Steven's heartbeat increased, his gem glowing underneath his shirt. He lifted the clothing up, glancing back up and down, unsure of what was supposed to be happening to him, to either of them.

A note like a deep marimba sang through the room. A column of light illuminated itself from its core, a crystal pipe that stretched from a circular indentation in the floor all the way to the distant ceiling. Another, some distance away, followed in its fading. Steven turned all the way around the room as each note rang in turn – eight in total. It was a simple scale, and after it had finished, they could see an octagon of points rising around them, shining their light on the two Gems.

The platform on which they knelt, however, was circular, making up the floor of a round room with infinite points in between each column. The boy walked over to one of the light pillars, raising his hand towards the surface. It was warm beneath his palm. As his hand came towards it, Steven heard a breath behind him. The Gem was looking up at him with those sightless eyes, as if truly seeing his presence for the first time.

"This – this IS you," Steven said, turning back from the fallen warrior to the pillar. "It's like – this is sort of like your, uh, your brain? Your heart? Gosh, I really don't know what Gems look like from the inside."

Reality was probably less resonant and spacious inside of an actual manifestation of a Gem. He remembered what Pearl had explained about their bodies, and the more he thought, the less he actually understood about how Gems worked.

Steven's eyes opened wide, and he turned back to the other Gem in a panic. He clapped his hands on her shoulders, squeezing just firmly enough to convey his worry.

"Peridot! She's still out there! I gotta get out of here – of you? Please, do you know anything about how to get out of here?"

The scale started to play again as she stared right through him. But before the notes, her brow narrowed, and she breathed in sharply. Steven looked back at the corresponding columns, where the lights shone brighter as the notes played. In between the columns, thin rods glowed faintly. But instead of stretching from the floor to the ceiling, they were twisted, warped, like they had been pummeled and melted by a meteor shower.

The Gem's teeth grit in determination, her body shaking as she tried to force the notes out. But the only thing that emerged was a foul shrieking, out of turn and warped to the point of wailing. Her face collapsed, and Steven saw the light recede from the pipes. In the silence, her heavy, pained breath was eventually overtaken by the same eight notes resonating through the air. The notes seemed to placate her.

Steven ran to where the rods had been, and found their shapes in the darkness. He touched them, held them in his hands. They felt like cold, thick cuts of glass under his fingertips. They might as well have been, if it wasn't for their twisted abnormalities that followed them from their base to as far as the eye could see.

Looking down at the ground, Steven saw that the marble platform actually extended beyond the borders of the larger columns, darkened by the nothingness. Peering beyond, Steven covered his mouth, his eyes tearing up as he saw the reality beyond.

There were so many rods, so many synapses that echoed beyond the center platform. With the Gem in the center, Steven could see hundreds, thousands of the intricate lines, stretching in unknowable yet clearly meaningful matrices in space. And every single one of them was in some way warped, twisted, bent horrifically. It reminded him less of a bent wire and more of a broken bone, like he was watching the ivory poking through someone's skin, snapped in twain, so painful that they could not even scream.

"The Corruption."

Steven turned back towards the Gem, seeing her blank expression as the scale echoed. It made so much sense now, this abstraction, this hideous portrait.

"All of these are memories, difficult thoughts, things that can't really be categorized. Right? And these big ones, those are like…"

Steven took a second to think, and snapped his fingers. "Those are core feelings, like love, and hate, and fear, and hunger – things that you need to think to survive. And those are the only ones that didn't break apart when the Diamonds hurt you."

The mention of the Diamonds made her eyes go wide. Discordant sounds started to fly about the chamber from the different corrupted rods. She could hear and understand Steven; that much was clear.

But there were so many questions. Was thinking about these things helping or harming the broken aspects of her conscious? Could they be healed by Steven in here, or was he just a projection? If he healed part of the connection, could he become corrupted himself? Or, he thought, maybe he was corrupted already. His stomach turned as he came back to the Gem, sitting down in front of her, wiping the tears from his face.

"Is this what it's like?" Steven whispered. "Do you even know what's gone? Do you…can you know what's missing? Because if I could help and fix this, I would, I really would. But I can't. I don't know how. None of us do. I can't imagine what it's like."

C. D. E. F. G. A. B. C.

"Not yet. That's the thing – you have to have hope that we can fix this! That's what we do! We're Crystal Gems! The more I learn and the more I train, the more that I can help you get everything back, even better than before! We can make Earth a good place for everyone – Gems, humans, even me. It sucks that I can't do anything right now, but I know that it's going to happen. I won't let you stay like this."

She stared at him, her eyes twitching, as though she was trying to read the child's face. Her mouth opened, but the words could not come out. The rods in the background shuddered and glowed, and Steven could see the pain on her face. It was the space in between the thought and the action, the visual representation of mental pain.

"Don't, don't do that, please," Steven said, his hands coming to her cheeks. "I don't want you to hurt anymore."

Hot tears slid over his fingers. Those eyes blinked, confused and worried, deep and tired lines etched in the Gem's face. Despite his protests, she couldn't stop the thoughts from coming. Screeching cacophonies drowned out Steven's gasps of horror as slices of sound flew through the air around their heads. A deep chord from the main columns rang out in what the boy knew was a kind of fear; he could feel it in his soul. The Gem he held in his hands reached up to hold him as well, wailing soundlessly with her fingers gripping weakly onto his arms.

"You have to stop!" Steven shouted, his fingers digging into her skin. "Please! I know you're scared, but if you don't stop you're only going to hurt both of us!"

The Gem's face twisted in his hands, her head shaking and her eyes streaming with misery and panic. The discord only grew with each passing second, and the entire infrastructure began to shake. A crack in space, the same kind that Steven had come through, appeared above him, severing this space from the darkness.

In that moment, dread washed over the child's body as he realized what the cracks meant. If too many of them opened, then this Gem would be without emotion, without reason, without the ability to maintain her physical form. The immortality of the species was being compromised in the most horrific manner, and it was going to suck both of them in. More cracks split through the air around them. Steven's ears ached from the choir of madness.

She wasn't going to stop until she had driven herself to the end. In the presence of hope without the means to pursue it, she had been condemned. Steven looked into her eyes, then into her Gem – one more life lost at his hands, and he was about to go with it. The sound drained from his mind. Truthfully, could he be forgiven if he let himself go? Penance was an impossible thing to gauge, but perhaps, a small portion could be given to the universe, some grand equation of souls that would take pity on his sacrifice.

No. No, not today. If there was anything he could do to save this life, then he had to try. Steven opened his eyes, his gem glowing bright red against the blues and whites of the roaring chamber. Releasing his right hand, Steven raised it into the air.

"I'll come back for you. I promise."

He thrust forwards and gripped the gemstone from the center of her chest. Affixed to her body, the tension was unbearable, and her fingers dug into his muscles, her eyes wide with pain, and now anger. The pained whines turned into a roar, harmonizing with her panic as the two of them felt the stone lose its resistance.

Steven couldn't hear his own manic screaming for the rushing blood in his ears. Blurred by tears, he could only see the shimmer of light erupt from the space underneath the Gem's chest, the inside of the body that he was inside already. Mirrored infinitely, collapsing on itself, the world went white once more, then faded to the blackness of unconsciousness. The fade here was not to the deathly place he had been, but to sleep, to peace. Steven drifted off, his fingers still gripping the hexagon torn from a body that was no longer.

Waking up this time was significantly more painful that when he had woken up in the dream state. Steven's entire body felt like a giant bruise, healing much slower than he wanted, but healing nonetheless. His right fist was still clenched with nothing in it, and it took a moment for the boy to remember what he had been holding in the first place. Even so, that panic wasn't enough to get him up and about, and it was hardly a panic in the first place. Gentle desert winds calmed him with the sound and the breeze, only interrupted by a screaming green triangle standing over him and grabbing his shoulders.

Peridot helped him into a sitting position, her forehead beaded with sweat, her breaths shallow and nervous.

"What did you do? All of a sudden, she just – whoop! Gone! And – Steven, what happened?"

In Peridot's hand, Steven was slowly able to focus on the object she was clutching. Orange dust covered the gemstone's surface, dusting it in a thin layer like cocoa powder. The small Gem wiped it on Steven's jeans, tilting it in the light before bubbling it in a green sphere.

Steven groggily reached out and held the ball, blinking the unconsciousness away. Even the muscles of his eyes hurt when he blinked now. Memory and magic moved his hand to the top of the ball, whisking it away to the temple in a blip of dismissal.

"Peridot," he said, "how long was I out for?"

"You were unresponsive for ten whole seconds! Right after you hit the wall, you lost consciousness, then the mutant volatized, then I secured the gemstone."

Whatever had been done had been done. The infinity that could have been was instead ten seconds of trauma and unawareness. How long could he have been in there? Steven knew the answer already, and his hands shook as he stood.

"Let's go find Pearl and Connie. They're probably worried about us."

Trekking back was slow and silent. Steven stopped by the stream to take a sip, his reflection shrouded in shadow and distorted by ripples. Peridot stood back, and when he turned to face her, she averted her eyes. Steven came forwards and gripped her hand, forcing a smile. Forcing it became easier when his friends smiled back.

At the rendezvous point, the pair sat. Peridot cleared her throat as they rested in the shade of the cliff, crossing her legs underneath her. Steven sat with his back against the wall, legs stretched until his toes were in the sun.

"Really, though, Steven, what happened?"

He glanced over, wondering what the inside of Peridot's head looked like. Were all gems constructed like the quartz soldier?

"I saw what corruption does from the inside." He saw Peridot stiffen up. "I saw what the Diamonds did, how it changed them. How much pain they're in – it's unreal. They want to be free, but their minds are just twisted up. I wanted to fix her, but I couldn't."

"Steven, it's not your fault! Nobody knows how to fix corruption."

"I know. And that's why I'm thankful. I saw that it's pretty much not realistic for me to help, at least for now. There's nothing that I was able to do! It wasn't like I chose to be helpless, or that I wanted her to stay like that. It was…impossible. Which is a good thing."

Peridot furrowed her brow in confusion.

"How is that ever a good thing?"

Steven thought for a second, but then pointed up to the sun peeking over the edge of the rocks above them.

"If I asked you to move the sun – like with your mind – what would you do?"

"Not…move the sun with my mind, because nobody can do it."

"How do you feel about not being able to do it?"

"I don't really _feel_ anything about that. I just can't! Nobody can! So why should I feel bad about it?" Peridot snapped.

She calmed her voice when she saw that Steven was wiping away more tears. The Gem reached out, but rescinded her fingers. The child took a deep breath, looking down at his hands.

"So many things happen that I know I can't control. Just like the sun – I couldn't have changed the consequences even when I wanted to. But I still felt bad. I still felt hurt, and I felt like I had hurt other people. And then there's this – endless problem, a problem I can't solve, that nobody can solve, and it's not until then that I stop blaming myself."

Steven sniffled, laughing under his breath.

"It's strange. I had to see the infinite so that I could see what was right in front of me."

"Steven!"

Connie's voice made both Steven and Peridot stand, stepping out into the light. The girl sprinted towards them, with Pearl jogging behind. Coming up to Steven, her expression told him instantly that she saw something he didn't.

Looking down at himself, he realized just how beat up his clothing was. Tears in his jeans scraped away what little denim there was left on this pair. His arms were covered in scrapes from where he had slid down and landed on the dirt. Three scrapes had turned the left side of his shirt to rags; he could feel now the holes in the back that the cliff face had ripped.

"Are you hurt? Are you two okay?" Pearl said. "We heard some noises down the way, but we couldn't tell what was happening. Steven, do you need – "

"I'm fine!" Steven assured, raising his hands. "Really, I'm fine, all good. Just – uh – bumped my head a little. Peridot and I got her and sent her back to the Temple."

He glanced to his side, and Peridot nodded, keeping a tight-lipped smile. Both of them had very obviously been crying. Both of them were bad a hiding it.

Connie and Pearl exchanged a glance of their own. Connie came forwards and raised her thumb to the boy's swiftly reddening cheek, brushing away a tear, washing some of the dust from his face."

"Really, I need you to tell me if you're okay," she murmured.

Steven's hand came up, and to her surprise, he held her face in his hands. Peridot looked on keenly; Pearl stiffened, remembering the spaceship. Steven had held the soldier's face the same way, with the same truth, with the same pleading touch, with the same helplessness that he had felt in his heart. Now, though, his touch was strong, and Connie could feel warmth in his touch, a controlled flame, like he was sculpting her calmness out of clay.

He wondered too – what was it like inside of Connie's mind? What was her music, the sounds that she made, the songs that passed through like sunbeams through a prism, like the waves through their hair as they swam in the tide together? When Stevonnie was here, did they have their own harmony? One mind, one heart, two songs –

Steven didn't need to say anything. He nodded, and his smile was enough to infect Connie, transforming into a laugh, then two, both of them hugging and giggling together with the Gems giving each other confused, yet acknowledging smiles of their own. Who were they to stop the kids from being kids, to stop them from laughing?

This harmony echoed through the canyon, devoid of any more cages, any more monsters. It was almost like there had never been any monsters at all.


End file.
